berserk.org

CycleU has something called an indoor Time Trial. Basically they have seven computrainers setup and networked together so you all race against each other.

Projected onto a big screen is the course, including an elevation profile. Below that is a little bar section that shows your relative progress in regards to everyone else. Think of a horse race type of thing. Finally seven vertical strips that coorespond to each racer that show current/max speed,wattage and distance.

I showed up with another guy around 5:30, for a 6pm start. The idea here is you spend a few minutes getting your bike attached, sign up, weigh yourself, and then warm up on the trainer.

They had some music going, and a stage from some road race to keep us motivated until the start.

Once we started, it was race pace from the gate. One thing I was looking for was to see how this would compare to cyclocross. It felt easier, but it was indoor on a trainer. I guess the thing that is different is that you’re at a constant, steady pace. With cross you’re jumping on and off the bike, and you don’t a steady rythmn going.

The other thing that was going to be interesting was to see if I could hang out at a high heart rate. Turns out I was able to last at least 16 minutes at around 170.

If you reference the VO2 test I did, 165bpm was Zone5 for me (which is the highest). So either I’ve improved that bit more or it was the atmosphere.

It was pretty fun to do, and for seven bucks well worth the fun. We’re actually scheduled for end of February so it’ll be interesting to see what comes out of that.

Here are my stats. I was 4th of 7.